


Singe

by todisturbtheuniverse



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age II
Genre: Character Study, Gen, Justice!Bethany
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-19
Updated: 2014-03-19
Packaged: 2018-01-16 05:49:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 388
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1334359
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/todisturbtheuniverse/pseuds/todisturbtheuniverse
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Prompted by taokan on Tumblr: Justice!Bethany, whatever strikes your fancy in that regard would be wonderful.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Singe

It itched away inside her mind.

She should have known better, better, better—hadn’t she seen firsthand what sympathy and bluster wrought? But the voice that had called out to her hadn’t boomed, hadn’t struck like lightning and  _singed_ ; it had screamed, it had cried, it had begged.

And she’d taken it in, like a child to her breast, and now—well.

 _Behind you_ , her friend warned. Bethany spun with her staff and knocked a genlock across the face, cutting it open from chin to temple. For good measure, she clenched her fist; what she’d meant to cast, a mere prison of ice, changed as it did when her passenger was worried. A thousand tiny flickers of lightning flayed the darkspawn’s skin beneath the sheen of frozen water.

"Scouts," she called over her shoulder, nudging the downed genlock with her boot.

Behind her, Alistair whistled. “I’ve known mages,” he commented, “but I’ve never seen  _that_.”

She followed his line of sight to her gauntlets; black wisps of smoke rose from them, stagnating in the still air of the Deep Roads. Beneath the leather, where he couldn’t see, she knew her veins had glowed up blue.

 _We’re fine_ , she soothed. The creature in her head uncoiled and drew back from her store of magic, still unsettled, but placated for the moment. She clenched her fist; the smoke vanished.

Turning, she smiled at Alistair. “I’m special,” she announced, trying for the confident smile Marian had always used to distract interest. “They’re coming.”

For a moment, doubt moved in her commander’s eyes. She kept her fingers tight on her staff, just in case. If anyone in her unit had a chance of detecting her extra baggage, it was him; he had trained as a templar, after all.

But his hesitation evaporated, smoke off her gauntlets, when a snarl sounded from deeper in the tunnel. “Somebody’s grumpy,” he said, cocking his head to the side. “Brace!”

When the first wave appeared, she glanced sideways at Alistair, waiting for permission. He nodded; she threw out her power, threaded it carefully through the roof of the tunnel, and yanked out a foot deep of stone, burying the darkspawn beneath it. Behind her, her unit cheered and laughed, picking off stragglers with well-placed arrows.

When she looked down at her gauntlets, they were smoking again.


End file.
